Goals
    1.  Open class with time of worship
    2.  Understand the purpose of this Adult Sunday School Class
    3.  Understand the nature and practice of worship in the life of the Christian
    4.  Understand the nature and practice of Corporate Worship
    5.  Close class with time of worship

Goal #1  Opening Worship Week 1
        Prayer: Invocation
PP   Sing: I Will Enter His Gates

Goal #2    Result of questionnaire in 2003 on Corporate/Personal Worship Practices

Over a year ago I surveyed the congregation to assess individual attitude and action in corporate worship and how it related to personal worship experience. Eighty-eight percent of all who responded said they would like their personal worship practice to be more meaningful and consistent. This statistic is very significant. It seems that I have put my finger on a weak pulse, spiritually speaking. Personal worship is an issue that needs to be addressed at C.B.C.

I also noticed a significant difference between the importance of a number of
different elements commonly found in corporate worship and those same elements often
found in personal worship. This seems to imply that the personal worship practices of those who responded to this survey involve considerably less activity than what they normally do in corporate worship.

        Focus of D. Min. Project
   
PP  The purpose of this Adult Sunday School Class and Small Group is to develop within the C.B.C. family a passion for God which is displayed through regular encounters with the presence of God and to experience the power of God in their lives as a result of these regular encounters. To make these regular encounters with God both desirable and habitual the C.B.C. family needs to develop a holistic approach to personal worship, one that is meaningful, consistent, and relevant, to their corporate worship experience. 

Question: What do the words in RED mean to you in connection with your worship of God?

PP  Goal #3    Understand the nature and practice of worship in the life of the Christian

PP  What is Worship?

From the beginning of recorded time, people have worshipped. History records organized worship ritual and activity from the earliest times.    These historical experiences of worship have helped to define and shape the meaning of worship today. This is both a help and a hindrance to understanding the nature of Christian worship. Individuals will often define worship by their experience; what they do or what they feel. Since not all individuals experience worship in the same way, specifically defining worship is difficult.

This is true of the microcosm in the local church as well.

Question: What was your denominational background (history) before coming to CBC?

Calvary Baptist Church is made up of those who were once Methodist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Dutch Reformed, Catholic, Charismatic, Episcopal, Pentecostal and Baptist. These Christian traditions have different practices and values related to worship, both corporate and personal. Is there some way to bridge the gap? Is there some way to define worship so that our individual experiences of worship can some how be a strength in our local church rather than being a hurdle we must jump over? I believe this is possible.

Quote: Tim Mayfield former director of worship for the General Baptist Conference once told a group of pastors. ‘Get your definition of worship straight. Everything you do in worship renewal will flow out of that definition.’

What he is saying is that our practice of worship is directly related to what we believe worship to be. If a church claims that worship is primarily teaching, its worship will consist of a few ‘preliminaries’ and a long sermon. If a church sees worship as evangelism, its entire service will move toward the invitation. If a church views worship as essentially praising God, it will worship primarily in song. 

Question: Is worship teaching, evangelism, or singing?

It is all of them and much more. Basing worship on just one definition limits worship. We need a definition of worship that doesn’t limit but is broad enough to include all aspects of worship.

Question: Is worship something we do? Is worship something we just experience?
                 Is worship a human activity? Is worship a Christian activity?
                 Is worship a means to an end or is it the end?
                 Is worship an event or something much more?

PP  Biblical Terms for Worship

Since Scripture has absolute authority for all matters pertaining to salvation history, faith and practice, and since worship is part of that life of faith and practice, before we can define the term ‘worship’, we need to know what term we are defining. While there is only one word in English for worship, Scripture uses a few different words for the English word ‘worship’. It is therefore important to know the scope of how Scripture uses the word worship.

PP    1. Hebrew: Shachah שָׁחָה   
PP        Read: Gen. 22:5
                -to bow down, to prostrate oneself before another.

PP    2. Aramaic: S’egid  סְגִד   
PP        Read: Dan. 3:5-6
                -to bow down, to prostrate oneself in homage

PP    3. Greek: Proskuneo proskunevw   
PP        Read: John 4:21-24
                -In the NT by kneeling or prostration to give honor, whether in order to express  respect or to make supplication.

PP    4. Greek: Latreuo  latreiva  
PP        Read: Rom. 12:1
                -to serve, to render religious service of honor, to offer gifts to worship God in the observance of the rites instituted for His worship.

    I find it interesting that all of the words for Worship involve some physical, bodily action. It is also interesting that all these words for worship describe something we give to God  not something we get from God. In Worship it truly is better to give than to receive. The receiving is a benefit of, not a reason for, worship.

PP  Scripture Texts Referring to Worship
    Ps. 29:1-2; Ps. 105:1-5; Ps. 108:1-5; Ps. 99:1-3, 5,9; Ps. 103:1-5; Rev. 5:11-14
 
PP  Definitions of Worship
    Having access to the same body of Biblical terms, worship has been defined many ways.
 
PP    To worship is to quicken the conscience by the holiness of God, to feed the mind with the truth of God, to purge the imagination by the beauty of
        God, to open the heart to the love of God and to devote the will to the purpose of God.

PP    Worship is the experience of conscious communion with God

PP    Worship is reverence paid to a divine being.

PP    Worship is affirmation. In worship a believer acknowledges that God’s revelation of Himself in Jesus Christ demands a response.
        Worship is conservation. The corporate  worship of the people of God preserves and transmits the faith.
        Worship is edification.     The worshipper gains increasing understanding of God’s person and truth because proper worship teaches theology.     
        Worship is celebration. Believers celebrate their union with the Creator of the universe and with the Father of His people.

PP    Worship, in all its grades and kinds, is the response of the creature to the Eternal

PP    Worship is an active response to God whereby we declare His worth. Worship is not passive, but is participative.
        Worship is not simply a mood, it is a response. Worship is  not just a feeling; it is a declaration.

PP    Worship in its broadest sense…a meeting between God and His people.

PP    Worship is the celebration of God. 

God has built into each of us the capability to communicate with Him and with each other through festivity and celebration. Worship taps into this side of our personality. It affirms it, releases it and frees us to experience Christ through the festive occasions which celebrate Him.  OT worship was highly festive, celebrative and full of joy. The celebration of what God did for Israel, whether at  Passover, or the Day of Atonement to name a few, were always a festive occasion.
True worship stands in opposition to the secular trend that denies the supernatural. In the celebration of the Christ event in worship the supernatural is affirmed.
Celebration in worship lifts the worshipper out of the doldrums of everyday life and brings meaning and joy.

PP    Ps. 100; Ex. 5:1; 2 Sam. 6:20-23; 1 Chron. 16:4; Neh. 12:27-30

While not trying to water down a definition to its most common denominator, Robert Webber’s definition is one that transcends denominational tradition and practice. It also unifies individual experience in worship to a common idea. No matter what your individual experience of worship may be, it includes meeting with God as one of the people he has called to himself.

Webber also adds that in this meeting God is present and reveals himself to His people, who then respond to God’s self revelation.  Adding the definitions and uses of the words for worship in Scripture, worship then, is

PP           ‘seeking to intentionally communion with God with the belief that He will, in some way, reveal Himself to you,
                                                        whereby you actively respond, in some way, to His self-revelation.’    
 

It is important to note for later discussion, that this nor any of the above definitions of worship stress the need that worship take place solely on Sunday or within a corporate gathering.’
   
PP  Read: Mk. 12:30

Question: What does this text say about our worship?

    -It says worship involves the heart, mind and strength (body/hands)
    -It says that worship is our display of love for God.